


Mages of Alandris: one-shots

by HannahGallifrey



Category: Mages of Alandris
Genre: Academy, Alandris, Elements, Gen, Mages, Magic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-12
Updated: 2020-08-12
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:14:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 12,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25856473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HannahGallifrey/pseuds/HannahGallifrey
Summary: One-shot stories from the Mages of Alandris series currently being written by Hannah Gallifrey. These scenes may be incorporated into the finished books or left standalone. some connect, some do not. Each highlights a specific character, a location on the planet Tai'Arda, or a facet of Mage Life.





	1. The First Day's Lesson

**Author's Note:**

> if you search the tag "magesofalandris" on various social media locales, you can find official art for the characters found here. I welcome interaction and feedback! don't be shy! the first book has its timeline done and will optimistically be ready for editing and publishing by the end of this year (2020).

As Hypatia entered the classroom behind Turley, she scanned across the others already there. One caught the mahogany-haired teen's eye near the middle of the room, a smaller girl with a head of tight blonde curls, as she waved and motioned to a pair of empty seats next to her. 

"Good morning, Turley! And are you going to be joining us?" She asked the purple-clad newcomer with an endearing smile.

"well, I'm-"

"I'm Lamborn, by the way, what's your name?" She offered a forearm to grasp before Hypatia could get out two words.

“Hypatia.” she took the arm with a soft nod of recognition. “And I don’t know if I’m staying yet, the headmistress is letting me take classes with each group to find where I fit in the best.” 

“But you’re spending the day with us, right? You’ll love it here, I promise.”

“Well, I don’t-”

“Good morning, class,” chimed an older voice, and everyone turned to face the front and offer a bow to the instructor, a woman in blue. Actually, there was a distinct amount of blue and yellow around her, though all four colors--five, counting her brand new purple dress--were represented here. 

“Good morning, teacher,” the class all spoke in unison, then straightened from their bow and took their seats. Hypatia looked around in a bit of confusion mixed with nostalgia. She had only been formally educated for about 4 years, from 8 to 12, when she ran away. This setting certainly brought back memories, and she couldn’t really say they were very happy ones. 

“We have a new student. Please, stand up and introduce yourself, trainee.” the teacher made a lifting, beckoning motion with her hand, and Hypatia almost felt compelled to stand, as if her rear end were suddenly touching boiling water or something. 

“Uh…” she had to swallow and try again, slightly encouraged by Turley and her new seat-mate, Lamborn. “My name is Hypatia. I’m 16, and from Oldwall, originally. I’m not sure yet what I’ll be studying, so Headmistress has me studying for a day in each class, starting with this one.” she looked at everyone that was now staring in her direction in wonderment, swallowed with difficulty again, took a sharp bow and swiftly sat back down. 

“Now then,” there was a rustle in the room as everyone turned back to the teacher, “I expect each and every one of you to be polite and respectful of our new trainee. I am well aware she is quite a novelty, but I expect you to treat her just as any other trainee here, am I clear?”

“Yes, teacher,” chimed the 8 other students in the room, with two of the three yellow ones, Turley and Lamborn, being the most enthusiastic. It was a bit awkward to be the third person at a two person table, but Turley had gallantly taken the spare chair that stuck out to the side, leaving Hypatia sandwiched between him and the small, talkative new air affinity. Hopefully she wouldn’t talk during class...Hypatia didn’t want to get in any trouble on the first day.

Unfortunately the entire morning was taken up with theory and anatomy lessons, and the poor girl was hopelessly lost. Lamborn certainly wasn’t, though, and it made her smile more than once as her rather short arm would shoot into the air to answer a question. 

“You must study a lot,” Hypatia observed as Lamborn answered yet another question right.

“I do, yeah. It’s really important that we know our stuff. It could really mean life or death for somebody someday, y’know?” she offered a seemingly carefree smile. 

Hypatia jumped at the sound of the gong echoing through the castle keep, signaling it was time for the midday meal. It was going to take some getting used to that tumultuous noise, wasn’t it? 

“Will you sit with us at lunch? The afternoon is for practical lessons. We’re almost ready to be paired into battle-groups, I’m pretty excited for that!” 

“Wait, really?”

“Yeah, of course! That wouldn’t be nice, to make you eat alone.” Hypatia didn’t bother correcting the girl as they all stood to go to lunch. She was excited for the afternoon lesson, actually, but...well, having friends was certainly nice, too. Once they were all standing, though, she couldn’t help but notice how much smaller Lamborn actually was than her. Well, shorter was actually the better word, because she was very stout and sturdy as well, but only came up to Hypatia’s nose, much like she did with Turley. 

“So...what do these practical lessons entail?” Hypatia asked of the two as they got their bowls and found seats in the hall. 

“Oh, that’s right, you haven’t done any spellwork yet,” Turley perked up. “I keep forgetting. It’s so strange to have a brand new trainee so late.” 

“Wait, really? You haven’t ever cast a spell at all?” Lamborn piped after swallowing a bite of bread. “It’ll be okay, it’s not as hard as it looks, I promise. It feels really natural, actually, once you start working on it.”

“I, uh...I’ve never actually seen it,” Hypatia admitted, stirring her soup instead of eating. “I came from a small town and kept my head down as a dock worker once I came to Alandris. Turley here is actually the first mage I ever met and I didn’t know he was one until Kuma told me.” her eyes narrowed a little as the other girl was now sitting with her mouth hanging slightly open in disbelief. “Hey, don’t give me that look. We can’t all be lucky in life.”

“Well, I know that,” Lamborn defended herself, snapping her mouth shut and taking another bite. “Anyway, the afternoon lessons are split by affinity, so you might be on your own. Actually you probably will be, since you have to start with the really really basics.” 

“Oh, goody...primary school part two…” Hypatia sighed, finally beginning to eat.

She followed the pair of air affinities to the large central courtyard of the keep, ringed by the classrooms and buildings of the academy. There were clumps of other students around their age, between 16 and 17 years old. A clump of students in red, notably mostly men, and a group in blue, a little more female, were on the far sides of the clearing. The set of green-clad students nearest them were almost perfectly split to her eye, and the same seemed to be true of her yellow compatriots. As before, there wasn’t a soul in purple. She was apparently even rarer than she had first thought. 

An instructor came over side by side with a second, both adorned with the open book symbol of the scholar across their brows. One, in yellow, immediately turned his attention to setting up drills with his students, and the other turned to hypatia, beckoning her to a clear area in the courtyard. 

She had to force herself to follow the woman, and stop staring at her. She was gorgeous in a way Hypatia had never seen before coming from her small and isolated village. She was wearing a red dress that stopped just past her elbows and a spread handspan above her knee, with trousers and high men’s boots, but that wasn’t what captivated the teen. Her hair was a deep, thick, glossy black, almost purple or blue, like a raven’s wing, and her skin was the color of the freshly tilled clay-dirt fields of her old hometown. Hypatia didn’t know people came in such colors and tones! 

“You act as if you’ve never seen a southern islander before, trainee,” the woman noted with a slightly concerned look. 

“I-I haven’t, miss, er, scholar,” she stammered. “I thought only people’s hair changed colors. Not the skin too.” thankfully, she wasn’t offended, and just offered a laugh.

“You’re not the first. And you won’t be the last. People from smaller villages often have that kind of reaction. Lamborn, over there, that you came in with? She let out such a squeal when she saw me the first time I almost fell over from the force of it.” she chuckled again. “I am Lehu, and I’ll be your instructor for now. We’re going to start with the basics and teaching you how to know your inner limits, the reserves of taqa that you can use for spells. Now, a spell is made up of only two parts, no matter how complicated it looks. Movement, and intention.” she held a hand out in front of her, palm down and fingers outstretched, then turned her wrist to put her palm up while closing her fingers together to a point, making a bit of a flourish. This caused tiny flames to momentarily appear at each of her upraised fingertips. “Now you try. Focus on putting energy out through the tips of your fingers. You won’t make fire, like I did, but you should see something.” 

Hearing a sharp cry of focus, Hypatia turned her head to watch the nearest group--the air affinities--doing what looked like a surprisingly aggressive choreographed dance, stomping, sliding their feet, moving their whole body in a complex sequence...but then it didn’t look like anything happened at the end of it. She just blinked in confusion. Had they done a step wrong?

“More complex spells like that are taught movement-first,” Lehu’s voice snapped Hypatia back to her teacher with a guilty start. “It would cause quite a mess if all these students put intention behind the spells they’re learning today. But you need to. Come on, let’s see what you’ve got.” she nodded and copied the motion, but nothing happened. She was too scared to see what might come out of her. “Focus. Movement and intention, Hypatia. Your element will never hurt you.” she tried a few more times, then was startled at a flash of blinding light and a sharp POP that made her take a step backwards. Every eye in the courtyard was on her now. Had...had the new girl just summoned lightning?

“...great job Hypatia!” came the first voice to break the silence, and surprisingly, it wasn’t Lehu.

It was Lamborn.


	2. A Scholar's View

So, it was now day three of Hypatia’s new life in the mage’s academy, and as she made it to breakfast that morning, she couldn’t help feeling a bit apprehensive. Today, she wouldn’t be with the friends she made yesterday. She would be spending the day--or, rather, the morning, now she knew what the afternoon entailed--with the scholars this time around. What would they even be studying? It could be anything. At least with the healers she knew what to expect, mostly…

“Hey, you’ll do just fine,” Turley soothed with a pat on her back as Hypatia stood up to pass her bowl and spoon back to be washed. Lamborn, on her other side, agreed wholeheartedly. 

“You’ll make more friends, I’m sure of it! Scholars are so nice, if a bit stuffy sometimes.”

“...thanks, guys.” Hypatia already had directions on how to get to the classroom and followed them, peeking in to find the class of 6 already seated and waiting for her. 

There was a long moment of tense silence as Hypatia stared at the students, and they stared right back, clearly sizing her up. It made her distinctly unnerved. Finally, a green-clad girl in the front row stood and offered her arm. “Welcome! Are you going to be studying with us now?” 

“Ah-yes? Today, at least.” she took the offered arm and the rest of the students smiled and became suddenly much more welcoming than Hypatia had hoped for with her first impressions. 

“Well, settle in! We’re doing presentations all week and it’s my turn today.” she let the arm go and straightened to her full height. “My name is Wildes. You’re Hypatia, right?” it surprised the younger girl to have someone already know her name, so she just nodded mutely and took Wildes’ newly vacated and offered seat. 

“All right, class, my presentation is on the basic grammatical structure of the ancient desert language, Fusha. Can anyone tell me where the major city is that Fusha is spoken in, and what its name is in Alandrin?” the other five hands around Hypatia went up and she looked a little uncomfortable. She didn’t know a blessed thing about this. “Yes, Weber?” she pointed out a boy in the back row. 

“Fusha is the primary language in Meddinas, which is called ‘Eastport’ in Alandrin,” Weber answered with confidence.

“Correct! Any business or trade conducted in Eastport, or Meddinas, is conducted strictly in Fusha. But this city is not where the language originated!” Wildes continued eagerly. “It began with the blue-robes that live in the deep desert, and that becomes obvious when you look at the structure of their language compared to ours.” she grabbed a stick of white chalk and began to write on the wall behind her with it, first writing something that to Hypatia looked indistinguishable from a single unbroken line of scribble, and then writing words and notations underneath. And there were a lot of those notations. “This,” she pointed at the long line above the notes, “is how you would say the pronoun ‘I’ when you introduced yourself to someone, if you were a single female of marriage age. However, this,” she wrote a much shorter scribble and a couple notes, “is how you would say ‘I’ when talking to a friend. Does anyone want to chance a guess as to why?” 

Every hand went up again, and this time, not wanting to be left out, Hypatia hesitantly raised her hand, too. 

“Go ahead! What’s your guess?”

“Um...it must be because they can’t tell all that stuff by looking at you?” she suggested, blushing in embarrassment with the solid assumption she was wrong. 

“You’re absolutely right! The desert dwellers are famous for their body-covering robes that are usually dyed with indigo, hence the term ‘blue-robe’ to describe them. Those coverings are said to be so thick and uniform that all you can tell about someone you meet is how tall they are!” that got a soft chuckle out of one or two of the students. “It’s actually considered very, very rude to address someone you just met with the more familiar pronouns, because you’re robbing them of information about you on purpose. Once they know you well, though, it’s okay to drop to less information, because by then they should know it all already. Then, it’s rude to keep using the distant, long forms if they should be close. Can you imagine, getting in a fight with someone over whether they use you or thou?” 

The lesson continued through every part of speech, from how they got the adjective for good and clean from the word for water, to the really weird way they measured time and distance with oases and the sun, moon and stars. Hypatia jumped again when the gong echoed the call for lunch, as she found herself engrossed in the lesson. At least it was easier to follow and more interactive than yesterday’s advanced anatomy lesson. 

“So what did you think? I’m hoping to go through the trials soon, and become a teacher for the beginning classes,” Wildes said as they all got up to head to lunch. 

“You did great. It was really interesting, even though I really didn’t know anything about it when you started,” Hypatia confessed. “I just feel like if I became a scholar I’d have an awful lot of catching up to do.” 

“That’s the beauty of it, though! We’re not all teachers. Some of us are scientists, and some are researchers, and some are archivists that keep the texts in the library up to date and tidy. We’re the oldest and most diverse branch of mages. It was a scholar that discovered the marking practice that gave us our Mage’s marks and foremarks. Ah…” she sighed and looked skyward for a moment, “Maker, I just can’t wait to get my Open Book…” Hypatia looked momentarily confused again, then remembered the scholar’s Foremark did indeed look like an open book resting across the owner’s brow. 

“This is a lot to take in and decide in four days,” she lamented as they walked to the great hall. “It seems like something this important should take more time, you know?”

Wildes stopped dead in her tracks. “Four DAYS?!” she looked aghast. “Headmistress really only gave you four days to decide on a specialization? But it takes a lot of students up to two YEARS to decide! You’re not required to choose a path until age fourteen, and most students come in from ten to twelve!” 

“well...I am already sixteen years old, though, Wildes,” Hypatia pointed out with a helpless shrug. “It’s on me for being a late bloomer, or a late discovery, or whatever it is. I don’t think it would be fair to all the other trainees to make me start back with the twelve-year-olds, would it?”

“...I suppose not. Come on, we’d better go eat. You want your taqa reserves full as they can get for the afternoon practical lessons. I saw that yesterday, actually. Was that your first spell?” she must have been referring to the rather shocking ability Hypatia apparently had to summon lightning as her element. 

“Is that Fusha?”

“Huh?”

“Taka, is that a Fusha word? It’s not alandrin.”

“It’s pronounced taqa, in the back of your throat, and, well, yes, it’s Fusha,” Wildes nodded. “Didn’t you listen in the lesson earlier? I thought I mentioned that Mages originally came from the peoples of the eastern deserts. That’s why a lot of our weird, non-Alandrin terms come from Fusha.” 

“You might have failed to mention it. But it was a lot to listen to and understand. I really don’t think it was your fault.” Hypatia looked down, a bit embarrassed at having asked what she now knew was a pretty stupid question.

“Hey, I’m just glad you asked! You could be a great scholar if you wanted to be, Hypatia. We’re all pretty naturally curious. And I wish you had gotten to start classes at ten or twelve, because you would have gotten the most important lesson of all here at the academy.” she walked through the door and grinned and waved at Lamborn as she jumped up and beckoned to them eagerly. “Hypatia...there is never any such thing as a stupid question.”


	3. The Forges

It wasn't a classroom that Hypatia was taken to the third day of classes. All she knew was that this group was referred to as Imbuers, but what that meant? She couldn't begin to guess. 

As she approached, it started to get hot. And not just hot, but smelly too. "Eww…what is that?" She complained, looking for the door. 

The smell was apparently quenching oil. It did smell like a blacksmith's shop, but it didn't look much like one. It seemed the students were running the furnace with their magic, rather than using the normal methods. Where was the teacher? There were only five or six people in here and they were different ages too, while the other groups had been sorted by age. Maybe this was sorted by skill level? 

"Um, excuse me," hypatia approached one of the smaller green-striped boys and tapped his shoulder, making him jump and spin around. "Sorry, where's the teacher?" 

"Oh, uh...I dunno. They were just here…." He looked around the room, then let out a sharp whistle, summoning a strong looking gentleman with a new symbol on his brow. It looked like the curve of a shield, struck with three bolts of lightning. 

"Ah, you must be the new girl! Hightree or something, right?" He offered a meaty hand for a nearly bone crushing arm clasp. "Welcome to the forges of the Alandris Mages academy!" He made a grand gesture. "We don't like to sit around in classrooms and gabble about theory, you'll find. We're the creators, Smith's and artisans and crafters of the mages. For example," he grabbed the blade that the boy had just been hammering. "Good work, Locke. This is a sound blade. Have a look, hightree." 

"It's hypatia," she corrected, looking closer at it. It was still far too hot for her to handle, but he was holding it barehanded with ease. "Sir why aren't you burned?!"

"Eh? Protection aura. Good thing to learn early, or you'll get scars quick." He handed the blade back to Locke with a nod. "Get Flint in here to Set that blade before you quench it the final time. It's for him, right?" The boy nodded and went back to hammering as the pair Walked away. "Now, hypatia, I'll be honest. I don't think this is a good fit for you. You look pretty uncomfortable here in the forges, and you've barely been here a half hour. If you can't take the heat, you won't make it here. My mother and father would tell you the same." 

"Would they?" 

"Ask them yourself, I'm sure my mother will want to meet you tomorrow afternoon to hear your choice." When she blinked, he laughed. "My parents are the headmaster and headmistress. Don't think that gives me any power myself, though! I had it just as bad as anyone else. I earned my place, and I know you can too. You'll find where you belong, hypatia, I'm sure of it. For now, the carpenter's side is quieter and smells better. Why not whittle something there, so you have something to show for your time here."

The man--Samuel, his name was--led her to the carpentry shop nearby, which smelled lovely compared to the forges. It was full of wood dust and shavings and had a few students of varying ages here as well, carving and working wood for everything from the inevitable quarterstaff to furniture and even small trinkets or toys. Someone at the back was whittling some holes into a small block, making some sort of wind instrument, and hypatia went back to look closer. 

“What is that?” she asked politely as the craftsman paused to blow the wood shavings from the new hole in the block. 

“Hmm? Oh, this? It’s called an ocarina. It’s a type of flute, sort of. They’re normally made of clay, but I’ve never been good at working with earth.” when hypatia raised an eyebrow at the clearly green-clad girl, she groaned and looked up at her again, slapping the knife down flat on the counter beside her. “I know, I know, I’m supposed to be good with earth, because that’s my affinity, but it’s like it hates me! Every time I’ve tried to learn how to do pottery it just crumbles in my hands and gets all dried out. It’s hopeless. So I’m going to stick with wood a while longer. At least it puts up with me.” she scooped the knife back up and went back to whittling away at the block, ignoring hypatia now. The dark-haired teen looked around the room, seeing everyone busy and no one needing help. She really didn’t know how to work any of this and didn’t have interest in wood. Surely there was more to see around here? 

Sticking her head back outside, Hypatia spotted another door she hadn’t earlier, and peeked inside to find a few things she was more familiar with. A large loom and a couple of lap-sized ones were on one side of the room, and there was one little girl who had clearly mastered the drop-spindle making very fine string while others wove. A couple of others were painting pottery with glaze, getting it ready to be fired for the final time. Nobody was making new pottery today, it seemed, or perhaps the pedal spinning tables were somewhere else, as Hypatia didn’t see any in here. 

“Hi!” hypatia jumped as the little girl with the spindle called out to her, making the others turn to look. “Can you spin? Or weave?”

“Um...both, yes. It was never my fave-”

“Can you card wool?”

“Yes? It’s not-”

“Get started, it will save us a lot of time...please,” the girl added as an afterthought. She motioned toward a bag of fibers and a pair of carding combs, and hypatia sighed. Well, this was what she got for wishing to be useful...she found a stool and got started, feeding the girl the straightened fibers as she made them, until the bag was empty a good hour later. In that time, the girl had emptied the drop spindle twice and passed off the threads to the weavers with the lap looms, who were clearly just making bolts of broadcloth that looked like what the uniforms were normally made from. “Hey, you’re not bad at this! Can you spin? My hands could use a rest.” 

“I definitely can’t do it as fast as you,” Hypatia admitted. 

The air affinity girl just beamed at the praise. “My family name is weaver, I’ve been doing this since before I can remember. Nobody’s as fast as me. Don’t let it bother you!”

Hypatia heard quite a loud boy’s voice outside their room, in the direction of the forges, which were quieter as most of the hammering had stopped for the time being. “This looks amazing, Locke! You really put your heart into this, didn’t you?”  
There was some shy mumbling that followed the praise that sounded like the boy she had spoken to that morning. Wasn’t his name Locke?

“Well it’s not quite done yet, what did you need me for again?” more indistinct mumbles. “Oh, right. You’re so good in the forges I forget you’re not a fire nature.” the boy offered a chuckle, which was returned, and Hypatia stuck her head out to see what was going on, curious. 

A tall, thinner boy with a shock of wavy dark brown hair was now standing beside the shorter, rounder boy from earlier. Both had their backs turned to Hypatia, but she could see the newcomer had red piping on his jacket and along the sides of his pants, marking him as a fire affinity. He apparently wasn’t another imbuer, so what faction did he belong to? 

“Right, so, you’ll have to explain this whole setting thing again from the top...I wasn’t listening,” the boy informed his companion, who groaned and stepped to the other side of the anvil across from him, so hypatia could now see both their faces. The tall boy had a surprising large chunk of copper hair, about half of his bangs, which naturally swept to the left of his face. 

“Oh, come on, Flint, I know you can listen better than you have been! Why are you so distracted all the time? You’re worse than turley!” Locke whined. 

“Hey, it’s not my fault! I’m a lot older than you, remember? It’s almost time for the warriors and medics to be set into battle groups, it’s a huge thing for me. I have to make sure the team I get put in will be a good one!” 

“You’ve just got eyes for that girl in turley’s class~”

“Have not! Lamborn wouldn’t be any better or worse a choice than anybody else!” Flint insisted, turning faintly pink. 

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah!”

“Name another medic from your class, then. Besides Turley.”

“Uh...well, there’s-”

“You can’t do it, can you?”

“Yes! Just...give me a moment.”

“You’re hopeless. Just listen now so I can get to finishing and wrapping your blade, Flint.” Locke picked up the blade, bare-handed, as Hypatia had seen before, and set it on the edge of the furnace so he could use tongs to put it into the fire. A protection aura was all well and good, but the more it had to protect against, the more draining it became. At a certain point, it just wasn’t worth testing the limits of auras. Once it was a nice burgundy red, he pulled it out, having spent the intervening time explaining what he wanted Flint to do once he placed the dagger back onto the anvil. “Ready?”

“Ready.”

“Okay, now!” Locke held the faintly glowing blade in the tongs on the anvil and stayed as far back as he could as Flint jumped forward, his left hand extended forward with his fingers splayed and the fingers of his right hand laced into them, right palm on the back of his left hand. The blade almost immediately went from a dull red to a bright orange and produced a sharp whoosh like a sudden gust of wind from still air. As soon as flint jumped back again, looking rather winded, Locke grabbed the knife up again and dropped it straight into the bucket of quenching oil. 

“Good job. That’s all you need to do, I’ll have it done in another couple days or so,” Locke told him, panting a bit as well, but clearly from excitement rather than exertion. It was always a thrill to the younger boy to watch an item be imbued, most often by its future owner. 

“Right, well, at least I’ll get out of afternoon drills today, probably,” Flint said, straightening up from where he’d been bent double to pant. He grabbed the smaller boy suddenly and rubbed his knuckles through the curly hair a few times while Locke tried to get him off and both laughed. “See you at lunch, yeah?”

“Yeah, see you.” Locke waved as Flint wandered off, stepping over to the quenching oil and bending slightly over it with a thoughtful frown to see how it was doing.


	4. The Library

As they passed through the set of wooden doors, lighter and easier to move than many in the castle and compound, Hypatia had to stop. She stood in awe of the rows, racks, and shelves of scrolls, papers and books everywhere around her, two stories high. There were werelights in reading nooks of each of the four colors, and there were desks where women and men toiled, the symbol of an open book across their brows.

Turley noticed her awe and nudged her shoulder gently, making the black-cherry-haired teen quickly shut her gaping mouth. She had never even seen a whole bookshelf, let alone dozens stacked together! The blond boy smiled at her and continued in, tapping an ash-blonde woman on the shoulder who was bent over one of the desks.

“oh! Turley, what brings you here outside of study time?” the woman asked, turning to him with a smile. She looked about 20 and had bright, lively blue eyes and the black open book mark across her nearly invisible brows. Her crystalline eyes immediately fell on Hypatia. “hello, who’s this? I don’t think I’ve seen you before.”

Hypatia bowed slightly in her nervousness and introduced herself shyly. “well, it’s nice to meet you, Hypatia. I’m sure we’ll be working together more than you might think. This—” she gestured around her at the grand room full of tomes and scrolls—“Is the library, and I am a Scholar. My name is Samanthiya.”

Hypatia blinked slightly. That didn’t sound like a surname, like many of the other people she had met the past two days here at the academy. The woman nodded. “that’s my first name. my last name was smythe, but it’s too common to keep. It’s an exception to the last-name rule.” Hypatia nodded. That made sense, and it had been something she’d wondered about. While mages were rare and very frequently only occurred one in a family, some families were larger than others. “now then, Hypatia—and that’s a very pretty name, by the way—what are you studying to become?”

“oh, I still haven’t decided. I have a few days. But I have been thinking of being a Warrior, actually.” She nodded and looked to Turley. 

“well, if you do decide to become a warrior, I hope Turley is put in your battle-group,” Samanthiya commented. “He’s a very capable medic trainee, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he winds up going through the trials early.” The blonde boy looked flattered.

“well, Sama, I brought her here so she could get a full and proper tour after the whirlwind she got yesterday. I figured she could use someone else as a friend, besides talkative old me.” Turley picked at the yellow piping on the front of his jacket. Hypatia, still   
barely getting used to the color-coding of the uniforms the mage trainees wore, finally realized that the woman before her was a water nature, as her dress was three shades of soft blue. Samanthiya nodded.

“well, miss spirit affinity, what do you want to know?” Hypatia turned dark red before she realized the woman had just known by the purple of her dress, since she knew she wasn’t doing anything to display it otherwise.

“um…I don’t know. You said I’d be in here more than I think, so, why is that?” Samanthiya hummed at the question, considering the many ways there were to answer.

“Two days, you said?” she asked Turley, and when he nodded in confirmation, she sighed. “There are years of lessons you’re missing, and no doubt people are forgetting that, seeing you at 16.” She turned and stepped to one of the alcoves, where a sheer tapestry hung, woven from some material Hypatia couldn’t identify that was so thin light could pass through it, as if it were stained glass. It depicted three men standing in awe of a fourth, who was surrounded by four symbols in their corresponding colors, and had a white dove upon his shoulder, which seemed to glow with purple light. “Do you know what we call the energy we use to cast or shape magic?” she asked after giving the girl a moment to stare at the tapestry. Hypatia blinked and shut her mouth quickly.

“well…I have heard it mentioned once or twice, but I…don’t really remember,” she admitted, blushing slightly in embarrassment.

“that’s all right.” Samanthiya turned back to the tapestry, gesturing to the seemingly floating white-robed man. “the word is Taqa. It comes from the eastern desert, where the legends of the Master of All began. In the eastern tradition, the families of those men who followed or were blessed by the Master of All are those who are mages today. From them came both the scholars and the healers, the two oldest classes of mage.” 

She stepped past Hypatia to continue out to the central aisle, then to another alcove with a new tapestry. This one had monstrous-looking people and beasts, and underneath a group of students, that seemed to be in the middle of some kind of exercise. At the very top, watching everything with a serene benevolence, was an androgynous figure that glowed like the sun.

“in the western isles, the beliefs were very different. They have many gods and goddesses, presided over by the sun god. They made both humans and monsters. Children who showed magical ability were often called demons, or accused of having demon blood. They were sent to compounds to eradicate their magic, but the teachers discovered that training allowed the children to do marvelous things. From the west, we take the martial training and dance that shapes our spells, and the class of mage we call warriors.” As Samanthiya spoke, she gestured, moving down the tapestry as she explained each point. When she was done she moved to yet a third backlit sheer tapestry.

This one, to Hypatia, seemed both more and less interesting than the first two. At first, it just looked like four men, bronze-skinned and barely clothed, one on a shoreline, one at a fire, one pushing a boulder, and one motioning at a strange-looking tree. “in the south, there are islands also, much smaller and a bit farther apart than the west,” the Scholar explained. “their take on magic is very different from others. Both in the east and west, the belief was that magic came only from within. But those in the south islands discovered that they could shape the elements, and control what was outside themselves. They could calm the waves, summon fire without tinder or flint, make wind blow the fruit from trees, or move massive boulders with little effort.” Hypatia stared at the four men with renewed interest. So the poses they held were parts of spells, then? “they also learned how to put that latent worldly power into items, like weapons, mostly, bringing us our fourth major class of mage—the imbuer.”

Star-struck by the sudden crash course of mage history, Hypatia suddenly realized something was missing. “wait, what about the trackers? I met one, but you didn’t mention them.”

“do you know what happens if a child with mage ability is never trained?” Samanthiya asked in return. Hypatia shook her head as Turley winced. “an untrained or overconfident mage can become a sorcerer, most always by accident. They are extremely dangerous and powerful individuals. Tortured souls. The trackers were born of the need to find those children before such an awful fate befell them.” Hypatia shivered. That could have been her. She hadn’t been discovered until 16, when most children were found by age 8, or no later than 12. 

“don’t worry, Hypatia,” the ash-blonde scholar smiled softly, reassuringly. “now that you’re here, you’re surrounded by those who can protect and guide you. Now that I’ve explained a few things, I can answer your original question.” She returned to the desk she had been standing at when they came in. “why will you be spending a lot of time here? Simple. Scholars are your beginning teachers, regardless of the class you choose. Besides that, if you wish to learn theory behind any particular spell, or want to practice in a safe space, you’ll come to us. Scholars are not only scribes or teachers, but archivers, researchers, and experimenters and theorists. If there is anything worth knowing about the world or magic, we know it, and we love sharing our knowledge just as much as gathering it.”

Hypatia took a moment to look around at the massive shelves of tomes as she did when they entered the library. “all of this…I can learn? You’ll teach me?” she asked softly, clearly awestruck once more.

“that’s right, Hypatia. I’m in here all the time, learning new spells and practicing the motions. Some of them are pretty complicated. You’ll see—Samanthiya will be another friend, and a great teacher for you.” Turley gave her the slightly lopsided grin she was getting used to seeing from him. She wished she could be as cheerful as the air nature always seemed to be.

From elsewhere in the massive building, a deep note sounded. It reminded Hypatia of a bell, but somehow different. Her mouth watered, knowing it was the signal for mealtime for the students. “why don’t we talk more over lunch? You must be famished,” Turley suggested, and the three of them hurried out, Hypatia in the lead—this room, at least, she could always find her way back to.


	5. A Tracker's Purpose

It was a beautiful day here in the Southern Isles’ largest Island, Kokomo. Lorenzo couldn’t help but pick at the clothing he’d been offered by the locals while his own was washed and dried. He was so unused to having his faintly olive-toned skin bared to the elements that he couldn’t help but stand in the shade with his arms crossed to cover his chest. They’d offered him a large woven bundle of flowers to wear over his neck, and he was regretting saying no now. And it was worse to have to wear a skirt on top of everything else. 

Well, okay. It wasn’t really a skirt like women wore. The women here all wore dresses anyway, with bright colors and floral patterns matching the native plants. The men all wore these sort of wrap things that, depending on preference, fell anywhere from the bend of the knee to nearly the ground. Lorenzo had requested one of the longest ones available, wanting to have as much of his skin covered from the harsh southern sun as he could manage. 

An elderly woman came along the road he was standing next to just then, a large basket full of native fruits balanced on her head. She glanced in his direction, then just started to laugh and walked right up to him, removing the heavy basket. 

“The sun-god isn’t going to fry you, little mage-boy,” she teased him. “Here, carry this for me and I’ll get you something to cover your pretty north-skin while you’re here.” she thrust the large, heavy basket into his arms and started to walk away to lead him wherever she was going. 

“Oh, uh, thank you, maam…”

“Hahaha! Ma’am? Such formality. Silly stuffy north-people. You can call me Baba. all the young ones do.” she waved a wrinkled hand to keep him moving along behind her, with both hands keeping the load balanced on his head. 

“Okay...um, Baba, where are we going?”

“To my house! I have the evening meal to prepare for everyone, the whole village! I hope I got enough fruit.” she glanced back at the full basket and nodded. “So, north-mage-boy, why are you here? And what happened to your clothes?”

“They’re getting washed and dried, right now. They got dirty on the trip here, on the ship.”

“You get sea-sick?”

“...” he sighed. This woman had been around long enough to know everything, hadn’t she. “Yes, baba.”

She just laughed softly at him. “Don’t worry, boy, even we island-livers have that a lot more than we like to say to people. Here we are.” she had him set down the basket next to a stack of other baskets. Then she turned around with a large cleaver in her hands, making him jump backwards with his hands upraised and her laugh again. “Come here, fire-boy, I need you to crack open all these tree-nuts. Actually, light me the kindling first, my tinder-box went out last night.” he nodded and crouched beside the fire pit full of kindling, carefully controlling the output of his taqa as he did the first spell any mage learned, making a slight pushing motion with both palms facing away from him, like he was shoving against a boulder or pushing a person away. Tiny tongues of flame rushed forth from Lorenzo’s palms and fingers, igniting the dry kindling easily and getting the perfect cookfire going within moments. 

“There now, I knew you’d be handy when I fetched you from the sun-shade, mage-boy,” the old woman grinned, offering him the cleaver to get started on the tree nuts. 

“Do you know why I’m here in the village, Baba?” Lorenzo asked as he worked and she started cooking down some huge, thick roots in a pot. 

“Of course. To help me with dinner,” she informed him matter-of-factly. 

“Well, actually, I’m a tracker, I’m here to-”

“Help with dinner. You’ll be feeding the whole village,” she cut him off with a stern look. “We’ve had your kind around plenty of times, every couple of years or so, and you always take away a child or two. The parents, they don’t like you mage-boys much, taking our kids. But I know why. I know what happens when you don’t. And I told you before, all the boys and girls in this village call me Baba.” she stirred the roots as the pot started to boil. “I know which ones you’re going to be looking for. There’s two old enough this year to go to your school. But all four parents, they hate mages. So we’ll have to get you covered up and a little dirty before you go out serving food.” Lorenzo knew she was referring to covering up his Marks, the taqa-induced tattoos that he wore with pride. One over his heart, signifying his affinity for fire; one just below the throat, showing he was a mage in full; and the four bird tracks that marked him as a tracker, entrusted with the essential duty of finding new mages to be trained. 

“With my help and my blessing as the village grandmama, no one will dare stop you,” she assured him as she stirred the pot some more. “But best we ease into that. Once you’re done cracking the tree-nuts, come here and we can get your marks all covered up while the poi boils down a bit.” 

They cooked and talked all afternoon, with Baba filling Lorenzo in on everything he needed to know about the two children, ten and eleven, that she thought would be marked, about their parents and everything about how they didn’t like him in particular or mages in general. 

“Now the last tracking-mage-boy that came here, he made a big stink about needing a ceremony,” baba told him as she had him help her start plating up the feast hours later. “Did it in front of the whole village, there was almost a head hunt. Was he just showing off or do you really have to do all that in front of everybody?”

“It doesn’t have to be witnessed by anybody but me and the one I’m marking,” Lorenzo explained. “But there is a little bit of ceremony. Up north, we usually let the parents watch, because it helps them see how important it is. I don’t know if that’s a very good idea here, though.” 

“Hmm, i see. Their only baby is going away, probably forever, and they hardly get to say goodbye. I see, I see. I will help you. We can do it in front of all the village once I explain to them that’s why you do it. I think they’ll see the truth then.”   
Lorenzo sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. “I hope so...I don’t want a fight or any nastiness.” 

“Baba, the nice boy’s clothes are all clean and dry for him!” called a young woman, sticking her head into the hut. 

“Oh, finally! Thank you!” he reached for them, but baba whacked his knuckles with a piece of wood she was using for a rolling pin. 

“You can’t wear that til later, mage boy. You already stick out like a monkey’s bright red behind.” she looked him up and down, then took his clothes and pulled out a bleached linen undershirt without sleeves. “Here, you can put this on, but not a thing else. Just this.” 

Lorenzo couldn’t help a sigh but put the shirt on, leaving it loose over the skirt, er, wrap thing he was already wearing. He helped take out the dishes and set them on blankets spread in the center of the village for everyone to sit on and share. 

It was easy to spot his two targets as they arrived. One had the faint blue glow of an aura of water breathing, and the other was playing with some pebbles in a way the Tracker had seen plenty of times before. They even came together, clearly good friends, and, as if to seal the deal, both appeared to be left handed. 

Later that night, once everyone had settled and much of the big meal was eaten, Baba stood up in the middle of the gathering. “I want to remind you of a story that happened when you were little, some of you before you were born.” the crowd fell quiet and watched her, face lit by the nearby bonfire. 

“When I was just a little girl, I had a baby sister. Once she started walking and feeding herself, mama and papa knew she was special.” she took a deep breath. “She used her left hand for everything and she always wanted to play in the kitchen, in the fire. No fear of it at all.” there were soft murmurs in the crowd that soon went still again. “They knew she was special. But when the mage-girl came to mark the new ones among us? They hid her out of sight so she couldn’t be found. They didn’t want my baby sister taken away.” she looked around at them all, her gaze lingering on the two families with their mage children. “They knew she wouldn’t ever come back so they hid her. And because of that, she never learned to control her fire, or her temper. And she lost herself. She became a monster. And instead of being trained and helping people, she hurt many. She killed her boyfriend in anger over a prank. Killed our papa when he tried to calm her. She lost herself completely, and when the mage-girl came again, we all came running and begging in fear for her to stop the monster and save us.” it was dead silent now.

“I know, I know, that it has been a long time now and nobody here really remembers. You all hate mages again because they take away your babies and they don’t come back sometimes. But it can be so much worse for them to stay. They need taught, so they can protect themselves from the evil spirits in the world.” finally, she turned to lorenzo, beckoning him to stand up. “This boy is here to mark your little ones so they can be trained. Let him do it. By that one simple thing he can save this whole village, and your little ones most of all.” Lorenzo wasn’t sure what to do, so he bowed low to the two families.

The parents sat frozen on the blanket they shared, but the two children exchanged a glance and got up, taking each other’s hand and walking to him. “You mean us, don’t you baba?” asked the bigger child, who had been playing with pebbles earlier. They looked to Lorenzo as he straightened up. “Please mark us. I don’t wanna hurt my mama or my family.” 

He offered a gentle smile. “Of course.” he reached out to the child, one hand on the head and the other over the heart, and closed his eyes and bowed his head. After a long moment, he looked up again. “I See your nature, and I give it its true name- Earth.” the child let out a sharp yelp and stepped back, looking down to see the black symbol now marked boldly on their skin. “Come here, it’s okay.” they stepped closer warily and Lorenzo stuck his finger in his mouth for a moment, then traced a triangle facing downward at the very top of the child’s chest as he continued to speak. “I Mark you as a Mage of the Academy from this day forward. I bless you with both Skill and Luck.” he touched the center of the triangle and the child flinched again, but didn’t yelp. They tried to step away from his thumb as he reached out to plant it on his forehead. Lorenzo just smirked reassuringly. “Welcome to the ranks.” he then turned to the smaller child, obviously a girl by the dress and the cloth doll she clutched tight. “Come here. I promise it only hurts for a tiny little instant.” he repeated the phrases, only changing the word to water, for her nature. Once he was done, he stood to full height and gathered the two close to him, looking around at the villagers to see how they would react. 

After a long, tense silence...someone started to sing a dancing tune! Lorenzo had to admit, as the whole village clapped and danced to the voices and drums around the bonfire, that this had to be, if nothing else, the most interesting Tracking expedition he had ever had the pleasure to go on.


	6. The Cursed Heir

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this chapter takes place over 20 years prior to the others in this collection.

3 days.

It had been 3 days since he was set adrift in this little boat in the dead of night. 

What little food had been stored on the tiny vessel was already long gone. There was a net, and a fishing spear, but he wasn’t desperate enough to eat raw fish.

Yet, at least.

The sun was hot despite the cool air of mid-spring, and it had probably already roasted his skin. It was red, and it hurt to touch. Gone, too, was the small cask of weak wine, only enough for two days, and he’d done his best to ration it. 

There was no land out here, nothing but the endless, gentle waves, across the whole horizon, edge to edge. He had a single paddle and no sail, not that there was any wind to push it. He had paddled toward the sun as it rose the first day, paddled furiously, if not to reach new land, then at least to escape the old. But now...now there was nothing. No one. He was lost and alone, more than he had ever been. 

How much his blessed life had changed in just 3 days. 

Mikail laid back down in the bottom of the small boat, facing the wood of the inside wall as the sun set for the third time to the rear of the floating vessel. What would his father do now? Without an heir, he couldn’t remain in power as a regent king. Mikail’s mother, Theophania Turley, had succumbed to illness when he was barely three years old, and she was the last of the royal bloodline besides Mikail himself. The torches, spears and axes were no doubt converging on the palace even now, but not just because he was no longer a rightful ruler.

He had committed a capital crime. His father had known “little Kai” was a Cursed One. he had hidden it from everyone, especially from Mikail himself. Any child who used their left hand exclusively, or showed a fondness for the elements or power unexplained, was to be put to death, lest they make a pact with Chaos and become a demon, preying upon the innocent and causing pain and strife. 

Mikail knew he had made no such pact! He was sure of it! He had always done his best to be good and kind to his subjects and his servants in the palace, even when the servant children weren’t always respectful of him as they should have been. That was really what had caused all this. A servant boy, two years Mikail’s senior and a head and a half taller thanks to his growing spurt, who worked in the stables. He didn’t like the spoiled little heir and had purposefully knocked into him that day as he often did. This time, he had sent Mikail sprawling and he had cracked his back quite painfully against one of the wooden posts in the stables. As the boy stopped to sneer at the heir’s misfortune and bruises, Mikail had jumped to his feet and made a shoving motion, though he was too far away to touch the boy. He was shocked when a sudden gale of wind sent the boy flying so hard into another of the posts that he heard a crack and swiftly saw blood as the boy went limp. As if that weren’t bad enough on its own, as Mikail stood shaking in shock, another stable worker had seen the whole thing, and ran for the palace guards before Mikail could call for him to stop. 

He had sobbed and begged when the guards came to get him, their spears drawn. These men knew him well, had watched him grow up day by day, but there was only fear in their eyes now. Mikail insisted it was an accident as they bound him with ropes and shackles--hand and foot, so he could barely move--and brought him before the regent king. They hardly bothered explaining what had happened to Mikail’s father. They only asked him, as the boy slowly looked up, whether they should fetch the executioner immediately, or wait until morning. 

“Morning,” he had said, and there was no love in those eyes anymore either. Only a little pain and a grim determination to follow the law he had upheld all his life. “Imprison him.”

And so it was that Mikail had been marched away to a little room in the cellar with a thick metal door and a tiny barred window, still bound and shackled hand and foot. He sat there all afternoon, crying until he had no more tears, until his chest burned just to draw breath. He had barely passed his twelfth year! This wasn’t fair! He was too young! 

There was no food for the evening meal, and not a sound outside his cell. Mikail had managed to drag himself to the back side of the room and curl up in a ball to protect his back the best he could. He wasn’t sure if he could sleep. He wasn’t sure if he should sleep. Why waste his precious few hours left in the land of the living? 

Yet, just as he was barely drifting off at some time near midnight, there were footsteps outside. He jolted awake and tried his best to scramble to his feet as he heard the door bar being lifted and removed. Had his father changed his mind? Had he sent the executioner early? But no, it was a pair of young men, hooded and cloaked, but Mikail recognized them as a couple of younger guardsmen. 

“What’re you-?!”

“Shh, Highness. Be still.” one of them produced the keys to Mikail’s shackles and had him freed in moments. “Come. we must go quick. To the docks.”

“The docks? What for?”

“You must live. But you must leave. King’s orders.”

The king’s orders? He was sparing him, after what he had done that day? 

“Quickly, highness!” Mikail nodded and followed the young men, where they had found an abandoned fishing boat and shoved him in. “never return. You mustn’t. Anyone would kill you on sight.” they paused, their eyes full of pity. “Be strong, highness. Be brave. We will miss you, little Kai.” he nodded at them and they shoved him out into the deeper waters from the end of the dock, watching as he paddled away under cover of darkness, until they left. 

Mikail sighed and sat up again as the sun was now gone, replaced by a pair of waxing moons and a sky full of more stars than he was sure he had ever seen. Sometimes he wondered if he hadn’t already crossed into the spirit world. How would he know? Surely no place in the wide world could look like this. He scanned across the thousands upon uncountable thousands of stars, looking for the King’s Crown and its guiding star, the Ruby, in its center. The sun was reliable enough in the day to make sure he was traveling east, but at night it was the Ruby that showed him north. And though the sun, the moons, and even the stars moved and danced across the sky morning and night, the Ruby never wavered, always twinkling in perfect north. But...that was odd… it seemed some of the stars, farther to the north, had gone out? In fact, as he watched, more and more of them seemed to disappear. What could be causing that? The waves seemed to change direction, and by the time the Ruby and all of the King’s Crown disappeared, they were rough, beginning to toss the drifting boat as the wind came up suddenly. It was a storm.

Mikail clung desperately to the inside of the boat for hours as it rocked and tossed on the waves that were soon several times the height of a man. The wind was a terrifying gale and torrents of water poured from the sky, enough to make him think he was already drowning in the depths of the sea. 

There was a bright light...it was so beautiful...Mikail sat up and squinted toward it. Was that...the sun? It was over? The storm had passed? He scanned the horizon in the morning light. Surely after all that, he would be lucky enough to find land? But his first glance was nothing but featureless ocean, as it had been. All that storm had done was push him farther off course, and Gods only knew in what direction. 

“What do you want?!” he cried to the uncaring sun. “why have you cursed me? Why me? What did I do?” he collapsed and sobbed, but no tears came. The cask had managed to catch some fresh water, at least, and he felt the barest bit better after a long drink. He washed his eyes and looked up--and stared. What was that? That white, square-ish thing, in the distance? It looked almost like the ships he had watched in the harbor…

Wait, it was a ship! Mikail jumped to his feet and waved his arms. A vessel that size would surely have a lookout and a far-seeing glass! He had to hope that they were looking in his direction. After a few moments of exercise, the rest of the boat became visible and the sail seemed to change shape a bit so it could tack into the wind, heading straight for him. He sat and grabbed his paddle, rowing as best he could and with his remaining might to catch up to the ship, which loomed ever larger from the eastern horizon. 

Poor Mikail wasn’t aware of how dehydrated and sunburned he really was, and how hot. His enthusiasm waned in mere minutes and he was awoken with a pail of cold seawater to the face a good hour later, gasping and spluttering. Several men surrounded him as he lay panting on the deck of the ship, and they looked strange. Their eyes were pointy and slanty and reminded Mikail a bit of the cat that lived in the stables back home. Their skin, too, was darker than his, though perhaps that wasn’t true right now, and none of the men around him had much in the way of facial hair, though the youngest had to be twenty at least. 

One of the men offered him a hand, which Mikail took, standing with difficulty and shaking a bit from cold, and shock, and exhaustion. The man looked the boy up and down, scoffed, and then barked at him. Mikail just looked surprised. “What?”

The man squinted and barked at him again. Was there something wrong with Mikail’s ears? He was sure the man was speaking words, but they made no sense. “I don’t...I can’t…?” the boy gestured helplessly as the man grew impatient. This time he bit out each word, though some seemed to have changed, and the last word was a Kah, just like before. When Mikail just gestured in confusion again and stared, the man scoffed again and turned away, motioning dismissively for the boy to follow him below decks. He led him to the kitchen, and thrust a ball of rice into his hand, miming eating it. “Oh...thank you,” Mikail mumbled and offered a small bow, which seemed to please the man immensely. He pointed to a chair and Mikail sat and ate while the man watched him for a moment. Then he stood and brought over a medium sized cup, handing it to him and miming for him to drink. Mikail offered another little bow and took a sip, humming in appreciation at the taste. It was something like the tea they’d had at home, but much richer in a way he couldn’t describe! After he had downed a second cup, he stood up to follow the man as he beckoned and took him to another room, this one full of hammocks. He led Mikail to one at the end and motioned at it, then put his folded hands against the side of his head and closed his eyes. Mikail offered a deep bow this time--he was, indeed, exhausted--and managed to clumsily climb into the cloth hammock, almost falling asleep instantly. But the man tapped his shoulder. When Mikail looked up, he pointed to his own nose and stated “Tai-i.” then he pointed to the boy. 

Oh, he must be asking for a name. “Mikail Turley.” the man looked very concerned, and held out his hands with his palms facing each other, then moved them closer together. “um...Kai?” he offered, to which the man brightened and patted his blond head. 

“Dough-itashimashite Kai. O yasminassai.” he just blinked as the man named Tai bowed and departed, leaving him to rest. 

By the time Kai was awoken, it was sunset again, and he was led back to the kitchen by another man and given an evening meal and more of that delightful tea. Many of the men tried to talk to him, but it was soon apparent that they were, in fact, speaking a different language that Mikail was unfamiliar with. He did, at least, catch a few names, and they were odd ones compared to what he was used to. What he really wanted to know was, when would they return to land? But he couldn’t ask. It was frustrating and tiring, but it seemed they at least didn’t expect much of him. 

After three more days of charades and sleeping punctuated by regular meals, he heard a cry from above him as he was out on the top deck one afternoon. He turned to Tai, who was at the helm, and saw him smile. He ran to the front of the boat, and there, at long last, was land. He let out a whoop of excitement and started to dance, making several of the crew members laugh at him and jabber amongst themselves. 

By that evening, the ship had made port, moored at the dock. He was taken along by Tai himself and led to what looked like a village headman’s house, if Mikail had to guess. Tai greeted the elderly man with a few words and a deep bow, which the boy quickly copied. He then said quite a bit more, stepping aside to gesture at the sunburned blond boy who couldn’t speak a word. The elder nodded a few times as he listened, looking him up and down. He uttered a short phrase Mikail had heard a few times on the ship, 

“O nahmaiwa?” 

“Kai,” he said with a short bow again. 

“Shoe-sheenwa doughchiradess kah?” well, that was a question, he could tell that much. ‘Yoh’ was for orders and ‘kah’ was for questions, Mikail had picked that much up. But what exactly he was asking was completely lost on the boy, and it must have shown on his face, because the elder turned to Tai and asked the same question again. “Nishi,” the captain responded with a slight shrug, adding some more words as well. The elder nodded and sighed, clearing his throat. “You...from Forbidden Kingdom, yes?” he asked in a halting and heavily accented voice. Mikail’s eyes lit up. “YES! Yes! I was sent away into the sea!” he nodded, muttering “nahzay, nahzay…” to himself for a moment before apparently remembering the right word in Mikail’s tongue. “Why?”

His face fell again and Mikail looked down at his hands. “I...I am a Cursed One,” he murmured. He clenched his fists and started to cry. “I am cursed!” 

“Cursed?” the old man mused, rubbing his chin again. His head suddenly snapped up and he barked an order to Tai, who gave a sharp bow and left at great speed. 

“Not cursed,” the old man reassured Mikail, pulling out a cushion from a stack and placing it for him to sit. “Not cursed. Never cursed. Blessed. By the gods. Yes, blessed.” two sets of feet came jogging back a few moments later, and another young cat-eyed man was with Tai, but this one bore tattoos in black ink on his forehead and chest, just below his throat. The forehead markings looked like bird tracks, and the one on the chest was a triangle facing downward with a smaller triangle facing upward within it. 

“He help you.”

Mikail looked up at the man, who offered a reassuring smile and a forearm to grasp. “What is your name?”

“Uh,” he was suddenly caught off guard by the fluency of this newcomer in his mother tongue. “K-Kai. My name is kai. You understand me?”

“Of course! I must be fluent in every language I can, when I travel.” he pulled the boy to his feet. “What element can you control, Kai?”

“...what?”

“You have an elemental affinity. A power to control something in the natural world. I can sense it. Is it fire? Water?” 

“I...I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Mikail insisted, getting uncomfortable now. 

“Yes, you do. I can see it in your eyes. Just tell me, Kai, please. I want to help you.” 

Mikail closed his eyes and bowed his head, taking a deep breath. “It’s...it’s the wind. I pushed a stable boy, but I didn’t touch him. I hurt him. I think I killed him. I didn’t mean to, it was an accident, I didn’t know, I swear!” he insisted, looking up as his eyes filled with tears again. “Hey, woah, easy, easy. I know it was an accident, Kai. I know. This is normal, I promise you. Now, if you’re willing, I want to help you-” 

“O Jee-san!” called a young girl’s voice as a ten or twelve-year-old girl came skipping into the headman’s house with a basket of tree blossoms. She stopped and stared at the foreign boy, then glanced at the tattooed man and asked him a question, which he answered with quite a long sentence. Then she walked up to Mikail and poked him in the chest.

“OW!”

“Who you?What name?” she demanded in his language, with a level of fluency somewhere between the old man and the tattooed one.

“Kai. and you?”

“Tenneshomi.”

“Tennuh...tennesh…?”

“Ten-neh-show-me.”

“...show me?”

“Ugh!” she said a few things in her language (that were probably insults on Mikail’s mental prowess, he had to guess) and then said “fine. Shomi. You need learn neehongoh. Stupid.” she punctuated her last words with a few more choice pokes to the chest, then confusingly offered him a flower before putting the basket down and leaving. 

“. . .what was that about?” Mikail asked the tattooed man, cupping the blossom in his hands. 

He shrugged. “Women are strange, no matter where you travel. But I hope you aren’t tired of boats, because it’s a month’s voyage to Alandris, and two more months over land to reach the Mage’s Academy.” 

“What? I don’t understand. An academy? Another kingdom?”

“You will understand, in time, I promise, Kai. for now, let me mark you.”


	7. A Raven's Flight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this chapter, like the previous, takes place 20 years or more before the others.

Corvi wrapped the cloak tighter around boney shoulders and shivered, sitting as close to the fire as possible. This winter storm seemed to have blown up out of nowhere, covering everything in a blanket of bitter cold white. This was so unlike home, where even in winter it was warm and often sunny. It hardly ever snowed there, and never stayed long if it did. A frustrated sigh escaped trembling lips and chattering teeth. None of the alandrin students minded the cold too much, and Kai was downright comfortable, asleep already despite the bitter cold. Another sigh and chatter of teeth, another tug of the cloak tighter around those bony shoulders.

"That's one thing to be said about the men's uniform, I suppose: pants can certainly be warmer than a skirt," a deep, kind voice spoke from behind the youth. 

"Te'o!" Corvi sat up straight and turned halfway around in delight to see him as he stepped forward to join his pupil by the fire. "Why are you out so late? And in this weather?"

"This sort of cold gets my bones aching," he noted as he settled on the log bench himself. "I wanted to make sure you were warm. And...I wanted to talk about the future with you, corvi. Tomorrow you take the scholar's oath. What do you plan to do afterwards?"

"I... well...I don't know," corvi confessed, looking towards the fire and away from the kind mage who already wore the open book that corvi would be receiving. "Scholars don't have the same freedom as trackers or warriors do. I suppose I'll find some hole in the back of the library and be an archiver with you. At least I won't deal directly with so many people that way…" 

"Corvi." Te'o's voice was firm and the youth met his eyes in surprise at the tone. "I came to give advice. I had a feeling you weren't certain what the future should bring you." He sat up a little straighter. "It's my recommendation, and I'll be passing it on to the head scholars and the headmaster, that you become a researcher. A field researcher," he emphasized. "Corvi, I have watched you every day since you came from Iberra, how much you've struggled to live something you are not. I don't want to see that despair in your eyes any longer. I want you to be free, and I believe this is the best way." When corvi's head drooped again and tears appeared in raven-dark eyes, he gently raised the chin up again. "You deserve nothing less than to live your true self. If you do choose to leave the academy, I will help you pack myself." He smirked. "I know a few green dresses with your name on them." 

He pulled the youth into a hug as tears began to flow down both sets of cheeks. "I... I'll miss you, Te'o…"

"No need. Don't be a stranger, and remember to write as you travel. I'll cherish each missive from my favorite pupil."

"I thought I was your only pupil?"

Te'o chuckled. "Well, wouldn't that make you my favorite by default?"

And finally, she smiled, even through her tears. "thank you... for knowing me."


End file.
